From 12 March to 23 August 2026, Serpentine will showcase a series of new paintings made for the show, alongside the artist’s monumental frieze A Year in Normandie (2020-2021), on view in London for the first time. Admission will be free to the exhibition which marks the artist’s first presentation at Serpentine. 

Celebrating Turner Contemporary’s 15th anniversary this spring, David Hockney will also realise the next Sunley Window at the gallery opening on 1 April 2026. Measuring seven by ten metres, Hockney’s work will transform the gallery’s iconic floor-to-ceiling window in the Sunley Gallery overlooking Margate’s beaches and the North Sea.

The Serpentine exhibition will unveil a new body of work by the celebrated British artist, comprising five still lifes alongside five portraits that depict members of the artist’s close circle, including his family and carers. These paintings are united by their frontal composition and by the recurring motif of a gingham tablecloth that provides the setting for each composition. In these new works Hockney combines abstract and figurative modes of representation. For the artist, all figurative painting is inherently abstract, so long as it exists upon a flat surface.

Accompanying the exhibition, Serpentine will present a large-scale printed mural by David Hockney  in the garden at Serpentine North. The work highlights a scene from A Year in Normandie’s spring cycle depicting a tree house. The monumental digital print will be displayed at the back of the North Gallery, echoing its creation in David Hockney’s own garden in Normandy. 

David Hockney said: “I have always believed that art should be a deep pleasure…There is always, everywhere, an enormous amount of suffering, but I believe that my duty as an artist is to overcome and alleviate the sterility of despair… New ways of seeing mean new ways of feeling… I do believe that painting can change the world.”

Recommending that people slow down and notice the beauty of the world around them, Hockney believes that everyday cycles, like a sunrise, are worth celebrating. While the world came to a halt in the Spring of 2020, Hockney continued his close observations of the world around him by producing over a hundred digital paintings on his iPad, working swiftly and intuitively much like the Impressionists. The format of A Year in Normandie was inspired by Chinese scroll paintings as well as the eleventh-century Bayeux Tapestry. Hockney’s digital painting tools allowed him to capture the essence of each scene, skilfully recording changes in light and weather en plein air. His radiant compositions combine flat areas of bold colour with playful pop-like touches. As the days pass, spring transitions into summer, then autumn and winter. 

Accompanying the exhibition, Serpentine and Franz und Walther Koenig will publish a catalogue designed by the artist. The publication will bring together new and insightful contributions from Marco Livingstone and Olivia Laing. Generously illustrated in colour throughout, it also features an extensive conversation between David Hockney and Serpentine’s Artistic Director Hans Ulrich Obrist.

Image: David Hockney, Abstraction Resting on a Red and White Checkered Tablecloth, 2025. Acrylic on canvas, 36 x 48 in. (91.4 x 121.9 cm) © David Hockney. Photo: Prudence Cuming